Different Law Strokes 4 Different Drug Folks: Racially Based Enforcement

Different Law Strokes
4 Different Drug Folks:
Racially Based Enforcement



by mesha Monge-Irizarry, coordinator, SF_BEDPC

In May 2008, a new coalition, Black &Brown Equitable Drug Policies (BEDPC) opened its doors;
(Redstone Building #209, 2940 16th St., SF CA 94110);
in the heart of the Mission District in San Francisco, one of the most criminalized Poor, Black and Brown neighborhood of the city, through harassment and brutality perpetrated by ICE, PD, Gang intervention and Narc units, particularly targeting the Youth, Mentally ill, Homeless, Immigrants... and yes, Marijuana medical and "recreational" consumers.

(BEDPC coordinator, mesha Monge-Irizarry, serves on SF Marijuana Offenses Oversight Committee at City Hall, as a "representative of a drug policy reform organization" since October 08).
BEDPC also provides online support at:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/BlackandBrownJUSTDrugPolicies/

BEDPC operates a 24-HR Bilingual Spanish Hotline at (415) 595-8251 and provides free, confidential support and information to victims of violations of the SF Marijuana Lowest Priority Ordinance;
BEDPC helps impacted individuals fill out commensurate complaints, as well as helping them through the legal process from the initial Office of Citizens Complaints, Police Commission public comments, to researching pro bono attorneys willing to take on their cases on a contingency basis.

BEDPC also aims at building grassroots coalitions to end the disparity in detentions, arrests and sentencing of all drug users/dealers along socio-racial lines,
i.e.:
White middle-class offenders getting off with a slap on the wrist and reduced sentencing, or merely a short probation period thanks to daddy's contacts and money,
and Poor, Black &Brown users and/or dealers who may face a life sentence on 3rd strike for nonviolent crimes.

BEDPC works in close collaboration with SF_Copwatch, monitoring detentions and arrests as well as incidences of law enforcement misconduct in 2 Poor Neighborhoods if Color in SF: The Mission and the Tenderloin District, paying particular attention to incidents of illegal, Racially biased Policing.

Black Drug Dealers More Likely To Be Arrested
http://www.komonews.com/news/story.asp?ID=28587

Seattle police deny arrests are based on race, but a new study claims officers are four times more likely to arrest black dealers than whites. "There's a lot of evidence that many whites deliver drugs but do not face any kind of risk of being arrested for doing so," said Professor Katherine Beckett . Beckett, a University of Washington professor, analyzed Seattle Police arrest reports and polled drug users and dealers at Seattle's Needle Exchange. Beckett determined that nearly two-thirds of those arrested for selling drugs are black. Only 19 percent are white, and other racial groups make up the rest. Yet Beckett says the vast majority of users and dealers in Seattle are white. On Capitol Hill, they make up 95 percent of dealers. "In Seattle I think we are going farther than others have in showing that white people do constitute the majority of offenders," said defense attorney Lisa Daugaard. Daugaard commissioned the study hoping to get the cases of 19 black defendants dismissed. The defendants are accused of selling small amounts of cocaine and heroin to undercover officers in downtown Seattle. The combined weight of the drugs they were selling was less than the weight of six plain M &M's. The street value was just $600. Yet, combined, the defendants were facing 150 years behind bars. With so much at stake, defense attorneys say the law had better be applied fairly. "This case is one of the leading examples nationally of an attempt to ask the court system to take some action when a racial disparity in drug arrests like this is demonstrated," said Daugaard. The Seattle Police Department says drug enforcement patrols are often a response to citizen complaints about illegal street activity. And the police chief insists drug arrests are based on evidence - not race. Next February a King County judge will decide if the drug cases should be thrown out based on the study results.

Racial Inequity and Drug Arrests
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/10/opinion/10sat1.html

"In late February, the Pew Center on the States released a report showing that more than 1 in 100 American adults are presently behind bars — an astonishingly high rate of incarceration notably skewed along racial lines. One in nine black men aged 20 to 34 are serving time, as are 1 in 36 adult Hispanic men.

Two new reports, by The Sentencing Project and Human Rights Watch, have turned a critical spotlight on law enforcement’s overwhelming focus on drug use in low-income urban areas . These reports show large disparities in the rate at which blacks and whites are arrested and imprisoned for drug offenses, despite roughly equal rates of illegal drug use.
Black men are nearly 12 times as likely to be imprisoned for drug convictions as adult white men , according to one haunting statistic cited by Human Rights Watch. Those who are not imprisoned are often arrested for possession of small quantities of drugs and later released — in some cases with a permanent stain on their records that can make it difficult to get a job or start a young person on a path to future arrests.
The New York Civil Liberties Union, issued a separate study of the outsized number of misdemeanor marijuana arrests among people of color in New York City."

Studies confirm that racial disparities exist in the American criminal justice system
http://www.crf-usa.org/brown-v.-board-50th-anniversary/the-color-of-justice.html

..........Some federal mandatory sentences have come under fire for discriminating against minorities.
Critics point to different sentences mandated for crack cocaine, a drug popular in poor minority communities, and powder cocaine, a drug used in wealthier communities.
Under federal law, dealing five grams of crack cocaine gets a first offender a mandatory minimum sentence of five years. To receive a similar mandatory minimum sentence for trafficking in powder cocaine, an offender must possess 500 grams. "Whatever one believes about the rationality of the decision to create special, harsher penalties for crack cocaine, the concentration of these sentences on black defendants is striking. " States often have similar disparities in drug sentencing laws. In a 1996 study of California drug sentencing laws, researchers found that possession of crack cocaine and heroin, more commonly used by minorities, carried stiffer penalties than possession of methamphetamines, more commonly used by whites.

Disparity by Design: How drug-free zone laws impact racially biased policing
http://www.justicestrategies.net/?q=node/47

Communities of color are disproportionately impacted by drug-free school zone laws. Densely populated urban neighborhoods, where people of color are more likely to live, are blanketed by prohibited zones, while rural and suburban neighborhoods are less affected.
Arrests Policy: Police should collect data on the race and release records of every person they arrest. Pros: This will enable departments to track officers who arrest minorities without sufficient cause. Cons: Police have too much paperwork already and the statistics collected will be meaningless.
Sentencing : Federal law should not make first-time drug offenders face mandatory sentences. Judges should be allowed more discretion in sentencing these drug offenders. Pros: Mandatory-minimum sentences cause first-time offenders, mostly minorities, to go into an already overcrowded prison system. Cons: Mandatory-minimum sentences are needed to show we are serious in our war on drugs.


The work of BEDPC is endorsed by:

Alex Franco (May 1 Alliance)
Cindy Sheehan (former CA Congress candidate)
Claude Girault (French Gov Official, Dana Point CA, ADFE Rep. for Northern America from Hawaii to Anchorage)
Jeff Adachi (head of SF Public Defender Office)
Justin DeCastro (SF LGBTQ Disabled Activist)
Millie Barnet (Oakland Senior activist)
Mira Ingram (Community Oversight Review Committee Member )
Morningstar Vancil (Harvey Milk Democratic Club member, former SF Human Rights Commissioner)
Pat Monk, RN (Noe Valley Activist, Hospice by the Bay)
Shona Gouchenaur (Axis of Love)
Vicki Leidner (Code Pink)
Willie &Mary Ratcliff (SF Bayview Black National newspaper)

For an appointment or to attend BEDPC Task Force meetings, please call
(415) 595-8251 or email